Thursday, May 19, 2011

If you go to the website for Rahsaan Patteron's record label, Mack Avenue, they have up the bio I wrote for him for his latest CD, Bleuphoria. It's a very, very dope CD. I've had it on repeat for months now. I don't think Rah or the label were crazy about the bio but they never got back to me to let me know one way or the other. I didn't even know they'd put it up until a moment ago when my RedBone Press publisher Lisa C Moore sent me a link to it, saying how much she liked it; she didn't know I'd written it. When I agreed to do the bio, I told the label I wanted to write it like a magazine profile. I didn't want to do the generic bio thing. What you see on the site is pretty much what I turned in. For the record, it's been eons since I wrote a music piece for any publication (that's not been my choice; I've just aged out of relevance for the music press), and I mainly make my living writing liner notes and film reviews now. I swore off writing bios years and years ago 'cause it's kind of a thankless gig, but I wrote this one for Rah 'cause I've always been a huge fan. As I said, the bio they have on the site is pretty much exactly what I turned in, except they inexplicably chopped off the very beginning, which was simply me setting up the interview by quoting lyrics from the song "God," from the new CD:

taking high chancesin this divine dancein this divine dance
– “God” from Bleuphoria

For the entire bio/profile, go here: Mack Avenue. By the way, a longer, much more dope version of this interview will be in Blood Beats Vol. 3

Sunday, May 01, 2011

"In the 1970s politicians and real estate developers promised New Yorkers that an expanded tax base was necessary to pay our bills. Now, NYC is overflowing with rich people and we are losing hospitals, teachers, and bus lines by the day. The rich got richer, and subsequent gentrification produced a homogeneity that undermines urbanity, which is dependent on the dynamic mix to thrive. As a result we have a gentrification of the mind as well as neighborhood. The panelists imagine how to de-gentrify New York and take her back as a place of refuge, insight, and a key global headquarters for the production of new art ideas and political movements for the world to enjoy again."

About Me

My work has appeared in LA Weekly, LA Times, NY Times, Vibe, Rolling Stone, Millennium Film Journal, Flaunt, and more. I contributed to the reference books "1,001 Movies You Must See Before You Die" and "Classic Material: The Hip-Hop Album Guide," and have written liner notes for "Chuck D Presents: Louder Than a Bomb;" box-set "Say It Loud: A Celebration of Black Music in America," as well as anthologies by Curtis Mayfield, Chet Baker, Luther Vandross, the Jacksons and Teddy Pendergrass. A Sundance Fellow, I've sat as a juror for the Sundance Film Festival, San Francisco International Film Festival, Palm Springs International Short Film Festival and Los Angeles Outfest, and co-programmed the FUSION Film Festival in LA. Blood Beats Vol. 1, my collection of criticism (interviews / reviews / essays), was published by Red Bone Press in April 2006; it won the PEN/Beyond Margins award in 2007. Blood Beats Vol. 2 was published February 2008. I'm co-editor of the literary anthology War Diaries, which will be published by APLA in summer 2009. I've lectured or appeared on panels at Princeton, Columbia, DePaul, USC and more.